Teacher Crisis Over Pay Looming

According to your Tuesday headline, "More of us can't afford home prices," the average teacher who makes $40,000 cannot afford the cost of buying a home in Broward County.

According to the article by Chris Khan in the same edition, "Bush's plan for teachers blasted," the average salary for beginning teachers is less than $32,000.

It was bad enough that two years ago through a flawed study that said teachers would want to live here because of desire to do so, some North Florida legislators got the small cost of living subsidy for our teachers eliminated in favor of their own districts.

Now, in Kahn's article, our Commissioner of Education is quoted as saying, "It is absolutely a mistake to use money as a hook to get teachers because you don't want teachers who are just interested in money."

That is true, but how can we fill 2,000 vacancies cited in the article, if we don't pay teachers enough to come and live here, even if we recruit them from Korea?

It is obvious that our state officials are seriously out of touch with our local situation, and they must recognize the crisis that is rapidly developing.